Our goal now, is to make our talking book library & audio books accessible and available to any Western Australian with a disability.
Chris Whitelock
Association for the Blind of WA
Our goal now, is to make our talking book library & audio books accessible and available to any Western Australian with a disability.
Chris Whitelock
Association for the Blind of WA
With the help of iiNet and its Freezone site, the Association was able to successfully complete its most significant strategic project of the last few years – the migration of its extensive library of talking books from its historical cassette format to digital files.
Established in 1913, the Association for the Blind of WA — Guide Dogs WA has provided life-changing services to Western Australians who are blind or vision impaired, for almost a century.
From babies to seniors, the organisation provides services to more than 4,000 people each year.
For many of the thousands of West Australians living with blindness or vision impairment, the Association’s library of talking books is their only form of recreation.
The need to move the library online has always been clear, but the high cost of Internet services has always been a barrier in regard to access for the pensioners who form the majority of the Association’s members. Prolific readers, of which there are many, would quickly use up the download quotas on low cost Internet plans, so it was essential to find a way to bring the cost of accessing the library down.
The Association needed a solution which offered fast and reliable downloads – and that was also cost-effective – in order to take this ‘lifeline’ service into the 21st Century and continue to support those in need.
To achieve this vision, the Association for the Blind of WA — Guide Dogs WA needed a partner who could see the game-changing potential a fast Internet connection would have to widen the reach of the Library service and dramatically cut the costs of book distribution. The Association was on the lookout for an innovative business partner, one who is not afraid to push the boundaries of new technologies.
In iiNet, the Association found an ideal partner – one with national reach, high-speed links and the pluck to break the mold in its sector. With iiNet the second largest player in its industry, the Association the second largest library of its type in Australia, and both organisations having an eye firmly focused on potential and possibilities rather than history, iiNet and the Association for the Blind of WA — Guide Dogs WA is a perfect match.
iiNet's Freezone has brought massive benefits to our clients, who are able to access content from our server at far higher speeds, lower costs and with greater reliability than could be provided by us hosting it on the Association’s premises.
Moreover, with a strong focus on open communication and finding solutions and outcomes, iiNet formed a desirable business partner. The Association can’t speak highly enough about the high-level customer care it experienced throughout the set up process.
The Association found a solution with iiNet including its Freezone – which hosts the server, that delivers the digital audio books for people with print disabilities over the Internet worldwide, as well as providing a commercial 4Mbs fibre internet connection and backup data centre support.
iiNet's Freezone has brought massive benefits to our clients, who are able to access content from our server at far higher speeds, lower costs and with greater reliability than could be provided by us hosting it on the Association’s premises. Before they moved the server into iiNet’s datacentre, their fibre link was flat lining with demand from the library alone.
Partnering with iiNet has allowed the Association for the Blind of WA — Guide Dogs WA to grow and realise its full potential. This has since meant:
